book reviews and features
Julian Barnes: The Man in the Red Coat review – all that glitters…
Friday, 08 November 2019
“Chauvinism is the worst form of ignorance” is the maxim of Dr Pozzi, the hero of Julian Barnes’s latest book... Read more... |
Michael Connelly: The Night Fire review - unputdownable
Sunday, 03 November 2019
Ballard and Bosch sound like some dystopian upmarket commodity. They are, but deep in with the low life. They are Michael Connolly’s new duo of detectives, one in semi-disgrace, one retired. Throw... Read more... |
Benjamin Markovits: Christmas in Austin review – Essinger family reunion
Sunday, 03 November 2019
Paul Essinger has quit life as a professional tennis player and retired to his native Texas where, over the... Read more... |
Jung Chang: Big Sister, Little Sister, Red Sister review – China's century in three women's lives
Sunday, 27 October 2019
In 1930, a couple of romantically involved Chinese expats in Berlin – both revolutionaries in their own way – went on a farewell date. One of them, Deng Yan-da, was due to return home to continue... Read more... |
Sarah Hall: Sudden Traveller review - lyrical and luminous
Sunday, 27 October 2019
Movement, flight, searching, the quest for a destination: as its title might suggest, Sarah Hall’s latest ... Read more... |
Chantal Ackerman: My Mother Laughs review - too umbilically linked?
Sunday, 27 October 2019
My Mother Laughs was first published in Chantal Ackerman’s native French in 2013. This year it has been... Read more... |
John le Carré: Agent Running in the Field review - fake news, Brexit and Cold war echoes
Sunday, 20 October 2019
That John le Carré! It turns out the agent isn’t so much running in the field as playing badminton. The master of the ... Read more... |
Hisham Matar: A Month in Siena review – memories, framed
Sunday, 20 October 2019
A Month in Siena is a sweet, short mediation on art, grief, and life. Ostensibly describing the time and... Read more... |
Thomas J Campanella: Brooklyn - The Once and Future City review - out of Manhattan's shadow
Sunday, 13 October 2019
For visitors to New York, it’s all about Manhattan, its 23 square miles of skyscraper-encrusted granite... Read more... |
Great Women Artists review - the book we have been waiting for
Sunday, 13 October 2019
Every now and then a book comes out that can change lives. If a survey like this had appeared when I was a student at the Slade, the struggle to make headway as a female artist would have seemed... Read more... |
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It all started on 09/09/09. That memorable date, September 9 2009, marked the debut of theartsdesk.com.
It followed some...
Philharmonia, Alsop, RFH / Levit, Abramović, QEH review - mi...
“Let the music guide your imagination” was never going to be the slogan of the Southbank Centre’s Multitudes festival. Its 13 events...
The Great Gatsby, London Coliseum review - lavish and lively...
In 2012, an eight-hour long version of F Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby...
Album: Dr Robert & Matt Deighton - The Instant Garden
There’s this mod milieu, harking back to the Eighties. Weller at the forefront; Dr Robert and his Blow Monkeys; all righteously hate Thatcher;...
The Accountant 2 review - belated return of Ben Affleck...
It’s been nine years since Ben Affleck’s original portrayal of Christian Wolff in The Accountant, who’s not only an accountant but also a...
The Inseparables, Finborough Theatre review - uneven portrai...
The Finborough has once again performed the miracle of creating a whole world in its intimate space: this time, inter-war France, where...
The Ugly Stepsister review - gleeful Grimm revamp
Although both of the Brothers Grimm died around 1860, they still insist on getting dozens of film and TV credits in each decade of our...
Album: Self Esteem - A Complicated Woman
Given that Prioritise Pleasure was Rebecca Lucy Taylor’s (RLT) Back to Black, and that there’s been a lengthy...
Flintoff, Disney+ review - tumultuous life and times of the...
Documentaries about sports stars are now a dime a dozen, but you can only be as good as your subject matter. We know Andrew Flintoff (usually...
Personal Values, Hampstead Theatre review - deep grief that...
“They fuck you up your Mum and Dad; they may not mean to, but they do.” These lines from Philip Larkin’s 1975 poem, “This Be the Verse”, sum up...